They Fly Now
by fargdingo
Summary: First Order troopers are in hot pursuit of three fugitives. A short prosaic interpretation of a chase sequence in the ninth movie.


There were 1st Order speeders chasing after two stolen vehicles. While the fugitives on these vehicles had been happy to attend the much-awaited Fyer festival, even on this occasion they couldn't catch a break.

There's Poe, the Resistance leader with as much resistance left as the people he got killed in an ill-advised bombing run – nothing dissuades this man. Then there's Finn, a former 1-O officer who's just verry cross with his former co-workers and employers. And, of course, there's Rey, the telekinetic mechanic, the everyman's jedi.

The 1-O vehicles are close, but the race is pretty even. If she'd had time to modify her speeder, Rey's sure she would leave them in their dust. She's doing just that by just maneuvering around this tight canyon. And just as she thinks the storm troopers might be partial to giving up, the canyon opens up to a big and spacious field of rock and misery. No defensive maneuvers to be done here.

Poe, hiding a criminal past, uses underhanded tactics to get rid of his tail. He and Finn, connected by the Force (of friendship), are on the same wavelength and can communicate in half-sentences complex schemes to foil the 1-O standardized efforts. Finn throws out a rope that wraps up around the pursuer's massive track that was designed for just this type of terrain, and Poe slings them into a wall like a sock full of coins.

Poe never talks about his criminal past, mostly because he's already a controversial figure among the Resistance. Many supported his mutiny in spirit, seeing Holdo as a overly fatalistic commander, while just as many saw his former subordination as a threat to Leia's power. What if the Resistance is taken over by a violent man like he? Will he order a direct assault on the 1-O main fleet again? When his spice running days are revealed, he's sure to lose the support of his followers.

And yet he can't escape it. Just now, as evil civil servants are consumed by a fireball, their bones snapping from the high-speed crash into a wall of sedimentary rock, he remembers all the thrills he had supplying drugs to people who clearly had nothing else to feel happy about in their lives. He felt like a renegade Santa, delivering gifts through thick and thin, murdering any who opposed his righteous quest. Maybe he was a bit up his own hindside. Santas were extinct, after all, together with kindness and love. The canyon opened up, they saw Rey come out on a parrallel lane.

Finn was worried. He, a former 1-O trooper, knew something his friends did not. He knew a lot about 1-O business – how their ships are layed out, how they operate. He was even savvy to secret technologies like light-speed tracking, just because he had worked on the ridiculous monster ship that had always had a staffing problem. Regular ground troops were put to work on maintenance and repair. With only manuals in hand, he had once worked on a malfunctioning backpack that had small-scale jet engines in them. In the manual, he clearly saw a warning label: TO BE USED ONLY IN AN OPEN SPACE. WARNING! MAKE SURE TO STEER AWAY FROM ANY ROCK FORMATIONS, SEDIMENTAL OR OTHERWISE. And if Finn had one of those backpacks – and those backpacks on their pursuers sure looked like the one he'd worked on – he'd use it right about…

"They fly now?" Rey shouted over the noise of the engines. If she just had had an hour, she'd fix the noise no problem. She tried again, to no avail. Of course, maybe the question was a little premature. Rey had sort of sensed it: Finn's anxiety often made waves in the Force and this anxiety was distinctly related to flying storm troopers.

And just as she was about to shout a third time, the 1-O drivers in quick succession pulled their front break and catapulted their partners up in the air. The living cannon balls had their faces covered by helmets, but Finn knew and Rey had a vision that they wore expressions a mix of exitement and fear. And up they went! Their backpacks charged up, emitting just enough force for the troopers to maintain altitude and maneuver around like birds of prey.

"They fly now?" Rey's voice didn't carry to the other speeder, but Finn confirmed her suspicion. "They fly now," he asserted. Rey couldn't hear him, so she kept repeating the question, trying to believe her eyes. She could fly, sure, but it required incredible concentration and she mostly just floated about when she did.

Poe, although connected with Finn by the deep Force of friendship, didn't quite understand what Finn had meant. 'They fly now' might mean many things. There could be new ships chasing them with flight capabilities. It was not so strange to see that. Why would Finn point that out? It made no difference to their efforts, after all. Poe also had sand and dust in his watering eyes, so he had no way of visually enhancing Finn's assertion. "They fly now?" he decided to ask.

Finn wasn't sure why Poe would ask this question. The information was all there, a warning about a threat from above. Just in case he repeated the words, but the vibe they had going on with the rope thing had turned sour in his mouth. They say the first cracks in a relationship start from petty things, and this was certainly one of those cracks. And Poe just stole these speeders! Thanks to him, some festival-goers surely had to walk for days just to get back home. Who would do something like this? How did he know how to do it anyway? Is he a criminal, a mob boss, a mastermind? How far does this unsavory and secretive past go? Does Finn really know Poe? Are they even friends anymore?

"They fly now!" Rey pulled dangerously close to the other speeder just to get her message across. She had been frustrated to be socially isolated from the group, so this was a risk she was willing to take. Her question had turned into a cheer when she finished processing the backpacked troopers taking off. What an engineering marvel! If possible, she was hoping to get her hands on one of those. Maybe she could enhance Leia's obstacle course with extra gadgets like these. Rey's imagination was running wild while her body was a mere ball of instinct recklessly firing shots behind her and driving just as well.

Poe wasn't on board with Rey's feelings of awe and leaned more on the side of dread. A speeder chase, he understood. A flying soldier, he did not. "They fly now!" Poe squeaked. He was taken back to his earliest memories, back when he was just a little mouse doing dirty deeds for the big boys. He didn't have a chivalrous persona back then. In fact, he very much doubted he had any personality at all. Just a tool for others to use. Was his bravery just a façade? Was he overcompensating for his lack of courage back in the day? Did he really have to command the entire Resistance bomber crew to sacrifice themselves for his ill-guided plan? Holdo had been right to act as a shield for the survivors. She had taken the risk and the responsibility, while Poe opted only for the former.

And so, off they rode, speeding through a spacious canyon, chased on land and in the air alike, chased by their futures while chasing through their pasts, off to the proverbial sunset they rode.


End file.
